After the competition, the home was moved off the Mall and taken to the Deanwood neighborhood to its new resting place. Additional modules were brought in and assembled on the site to make the home a duplex equipped to provide housing for two families. A number or organizations and sponsors helped along the way, including Binational Softwood Lumber Council, Jones Lang LaSalle, Metlife Foundation, Tess Dempsey Design, and Sheila Johnson and the Washington Mystics; as well as community organizations such as Groundwork Anacostia River DC, which provides environmental education and restoration projects to neighborhoods along the river. The home adheres to Passive House design principles and is net-zero with the help of a modest photovoltaic system.

The ribbon cutting and completion ceremony was held on December 4th. Lakiya Culley, a Deanwood resident and single mother of three young children, who works as a secretary for the U.S. Department of State, will move into the house in January. The second family was recently selected and will move in soon as well.

“This project fulfills a longstanding vision of our team to create a house that would endure in a meaningful way after the Solar Decathlon was over,” said Joel Towers, executive dean of Parsons The New School for Design. “Empowerhouse illustrates The New School’s commitment to design-led civic engagement, and is a true model of affordable sustainable housing that has the potential for national as well as international replication. Due to the success of this project, Parsons is now in the planning stages of a second project to build a home with Habitat in Philadelphia.”

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“(Empowerhoue)…has the potential for national as well as international replication”. In which case I say god help us all! Once you get past the good intentions and the green specs, this house is an abomination that ignores proportion, contextualism and the basics of good design. I’m sure the project’s grads will eventually enter the marketplace and give our cities and ‘burbs endless “replication” of structures designed from the inside out.